No, Keith Hernandez said, he hadn`t read Thursday morning`s edition of the New York Daily News. In it, Jimmy Breslin, a rather estimable syndicated columnist, suggested Hernandez could be doing time at a nearby prison on Rikers Island, with his fellow cocaine users.
Instead, of course, what Hernandez did this blissful autumn afternoon was play baseball for a living, and a good living at that. In fact, Hernandez was a hero because his ninth-inning single brought home the winning run in the New York Mets` taut 7-6 victory over the St. Louis Cardinals at Shea Stadium.
What a series this was–three one-run games, the Mets winning two to assume first place in the National League East. What a day this was in the Big Apple–”Baseball Thursday” they called it, for not far away in the Bronx, the white-hot Yankees would open a pivotal four-game set against their protagonists in the American League East, the Toronto Blue Jays.
”This is what it`s all about, pennant races in September,” said Hernandez, who was compelled to make a curtain call from the home dugout, so raucous was the response by 50,453 fans–part of the Mets` largest attendance for a three-date squareoff here since 1971.
The reception was not new to Hernandez, a deft first baseman and the kind of hitter you want on your side at this juncture of the season. Tuesday night, when this confrontation began, the sight of Hernandez prompted a standing ovation. ”Meant more to me than anything I`ve ever experienced in baseball,” he said.
What a week it had been for Keith Hernandez. He had come to Shea from Los Angeles, where the Mets played three tough games against the Dodgers. But they couldn`t have been tougher than these three against the Cardinals, Hernandez theorized, because ”this is the most emotional series I ever remember.” Then again, nothing was quite as tough as what came before Los Angeles, which was Pittsburgh.
It was there, in a federal courtroom, that Hernandez admitted being dominated by cocaine for 3 1/2 years. He likened his habit to a demon, he said he had a love affair with the stuff, and he said he became so scared that he quit it. He also said he was sorry. Where might Richard Nixon be if he`d said the same two words?
”I don`t know,” pondered Hernandez, a literate man, a student of history. ”The reason I apologized was because I did something bad. It`s in the past, which is where I`d like to keep it. But I owed something to the fans of New York, who`ve treated me great, and to the fans of St. Louis. I screwed up.”
St. Louis is where Hernandez starred during 7 1/2 seasons, until June of 1983, when he was traded. Whitey Herzog, who operates the Cardinals with a strong hand that can become a fist when necessary, was widely ridiculed for the deal. He never said why he did it. He still hasn`t.
”Whitey had a chance,” Hernandez realized. ”In the testimony, I said he came into a meeting in St. Louis and told us he knew three of us were using drugs. If we didn`t admit it, we were gone. Soon, I was gone. He had a chance the other day to take a shot at me. But instead he went the other way. He said that wasn`t the reason. I appreciate it.”
Hernandez considered having a long heart-to-heart with Herzog during this series, but it never developed. ”We`ve talked some since I left, but I`d like to be friends again,” Hernandez said. Now it will have to wait until early October, when the Mets and Cardinals might decide the half-pennant with three more jousts in St. Louis.
”I can`t imagine this thing isn`t going to come down to the wire,”
Hernandez predicted. ”These are two good ballclubs. They`ve beaten up on us a little earlier this year, so it was important for us to win this series. Maybe more important than it was for them.”
The Mets almost blew the assignment. Against Cardinal ace Joaquin Andujar, who has won once since Aug. 8, New York seized a 6-0 lead after two innings. But St. Louis, which was supposed to fold months ago, didn`t, and tied it 6-6 on Willie McGee`s homer off whiplashed Jessie Orosco in the top of the ninth.
”This would have been a terrible game for us to lose,” Hernandez figured. ”As great as it would have been for them, that`s how terrible it would have been for us. Not that either of us is going to give up. We have all winter to sleep. We`ve come too far, and there`s not a lot left to go.”
Hernandez admits whenever he sees the Cardinals across the field, he gets a little twinge. He thought he`d be in St. Louis for life, after all. He`d shared the league`s MVP award in 1979 and hoped he`d be a fixture. Then he was dispatched to New York under a cloud of innuendo. Now, not only was his marriage gone but his favorite arena, too.
”I was shocked the rest of that season,” Hernandez said. ”We were in last place then. No Dwight Gooden, no guys like we`ve got now. I thought I was buried. It took me awhile to change, but I love it now. It all worked out for the best, just like today.”
Thursday, Hernandez was 0-for-4 when he faced hard-throwing Ken Dayley with Mookie Wilson on second base. Hernandez, employing ”my best inside-out swing,” slapped a line drive to left and collected his 22th game-winning RBI of the season. That tied White Sox Harold Baines` 1983 major league record for a relatively new category.
”The statistic doesn`t mean much to me,” Hernandez said, ”but the hit does, and so does the run, but mostly the win. If they`d have come back today, it might have uplifted them for who knows how long. I didn`t feel that good at the plate, but you`ve got to shut out those other four at-bats. In this game, what`s past is past.”
Keith Hernandez, who said he was sorry, has asports for a living would say that Jimmy Breslin has a point, too.
